Interesting.
More on leptin
http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/the- ... leptin-faq
Leptin is a protein that's made in the fat cells, circulates in the bloodstream, and goes to the brain.
When leptin levels are at a certain threshold your brain senses that you have energy sufficiency, which means you can burn energy at a normal rate, eat food at a normal amount.
But when people diet, they eat less and their fat cells lose some fat, which then decreases the amount of leptin produced. Several processes begin within the body to drive leptin levels back up.
The problem is that overweight people have large amounts of leptin, but their brains aren't getting the important signal to stop eating. That phenomenon is called ‘leptin resistance'.
Many scientists explored leptin as a possible treatment for obesity; they believed that if people were leptin-deficient, giving them leptin would raise levels, which would signal them to stop overeating. "But when you started giving it to people, it didn't work so well".
Rather than taking supplements that haven’t been fully proven to help, overweight people have other options to aid leptin functioning, experts say. Lustig advises them to reduce resistance to insulin (a hormone that controls blood sugar) and to bring down high levels of triglycerides (a blood lipid).
“Insulin resistance generates leptin resistance. The practical advice is: Get your insulin down,†Lustig says. “How do you get insulin down? The best way is don’t let it go up. Sugar makes insulin go up. We are overdosed on sugar in this country. I think that if we got the sugar down, our insulin resistance would improve and that would help with the weight loss.â€